Matthew's Journal

Thanks to an offer of a game from a friend, I picked up my Tennis racket this week for the first time in years. I haven't played any kind of real game since I lived in the dorms as an undergraduate. Christina and I hit the ball around a little bit Wednesday afternoon at the Tennis courts at Carmichael Gym here at NCSU. Thursday afternoon, I played a set with Ben, one of my fellow graduate students.

Tennis is a strange thing. Unlike some other sports, you not only have to practice on a semi-regular basis to stay at the top of your game, but you have to practice semi-regularly just to maintain fundamental skills. My ground strokes were pretty bad. However, I can at least say that I remember how the mechanics of a shot is supposed to work, even if my body is unsuccessful at carrying out the required motions. It seems I would hit seven lousy shots followed by one brilliant shot. Another big problem with my game was footwork. It's like I forgot how to get myself in the proper place to hit the ball. Being in the wrong spot to hit a tennis ball will result in a terrible shot regardless of how good or bad your form is. On the bright side, it seems like my serve didn't degrade at all over the years. Now, my serve was never very good, but I can still pull out a few big ones.

My serve has brought one thing into light however. I'm not in as good of shape as I was 5-7 years ago. I'm slower to react to incoming shots. Also, I think I'm either missing some flexibility in my upper body or else I've injured something in my right shoulder without realizing it. Every time I try to hit a hard serve, it hurts my shoulder. I know I should be drawing more power from my legs to propel the ball, but I never remember hitting hard serves causing the pain that they did this week. Maybe I'm just out of shape and it will get better with time.

Anyway, I hadn't played Tennis for a long time and I enjoyed playing again. Hopefully, I'll keep it up. I need some more physical activity in my life to keep me from getting too out of shape.